EU must get serious about tackling Islamophobia

In a context of generalised suspicion against Islam, it is all the more important that EU policy makers see Muslims as human beings who enjoy fundamental rights as any other person, write the signatories of an open letter sent to the European Commission. [ibourgeault_tasse / Flickr]

The European Commission is appointing its new coordinator on anti-Muslim hatred. This is a key opportunity to re-assess this role and ensure the coordinator has a clear human rights based mandate and meaningful resources to tackle racism and discrimination against Muslim communities in Europe, which have been lacking so far.

By NGOs members of an informal European coalition against Islamophobia.

In December 2015, following the first ever European Commission Fundamental Rights Colloquium, the appointment of a European Commission Coordinator on combating anti-Muslim hatred was a welcome move. This was a strong and concrete commitment to tackle increasing racism against Muslim people in Europe.

The coordinator took some steps to increase the relationship with NGOs and the recognition of anti-Muslim hatred. However, two years after the coordinator’s appointment, this political commitment must now lead to a shift in strategic approach, understanding of the issue and to tangible actions, which have been lacking so far.

The current political context makes this all the more urgent. In several EU countries, islamophobic discourses are being spewed by government representatives and are shaping the way laws and policies are being developed and adopted, but also practices.

The latest example is in Denmark, where the government is introducing a new set of laws dubbed the “ghetto package” to regulate neighbourhoods with a high percentage of low income and Muslim and immigrant families, including mandatory instruction in “Danish values” for pre-school children at least 25 hours a week. In addition, this has an impact on people’s lives and the racist incidents and discrimination they face.

In Belgium this week, a 19-year old Muslim woman was attacked by two men who pulled her headscarf and her shirt off, used a sharp object to cut her body and called her “filthy arab”.

From Syria to an integration centre and finally to a new home in Prague. A refugee’s path may rake this route. But life for Arabs in the Central European country also has its dark sides. EURACTIV Czech Republic reports.

On Thursday 5 July, organisations part of a European coalition against Islamophobia sent an open letter calling on European Commission Vice-President Timmermans and Commissioner Jourová to provide their Coordinator on anti-Muslim hatred with a clear human rights-based mandate and meaningful resources. The European Commission’s decision to appoint a new coordinator is an opportunity to make this happen.

Indeed, there are serious gaps in the mandate and approach of the coordinator to ensure meaningful participation of Muslim communities and anti-racism NGOs and to develop policies to combat Islamophobia. The appointment of one dedicated person does not replace strong political will, actions and effective policies.

Inadequate human and financial resources, expertise, objectives and evaluation processes partly explain disappointing results to date. The lack of transparency concerning meetings with national governments, the failure to organise a meeting between NGOs and Commissioners, the framing of anti-Muslim hatred as a religious and security issue instead of a human rights one, the absence of European Commission representatives at several events on Muslim women’s rights and the engagement of the coordinator with very questionable figures fuelling Islamophobia, are among the most problematic illustrations of these systematic gaps.

In a context of generalised suspicion of Muslims, it is all the more important that EU policy makers advancing equality and non-discrimination see Muslims as human beings who enjoy fundamental rights as any other person. The fight against Islamophobia is about politically addressing structural forms of discrimination and racism affecting Muslims or those perceived as such.

A distinguished Arab diplomat remarked that EU politicians and think tank representatives did not make use of keywords such as “Iraq” or “Islam” while discussing the Union’s relations with its neighbours and the refugee crisis for several hours.

If the European Commission is serious about upholding European core values of equality and non-discrimination, it needs to make important strategic changes and concrete actions including:

Profile of the coordinator: The coordinator should be appointed based on relevant skills and competences in order to work meaningfully on the issue of Islamophobia as a form of racism. This will also facilitate the relationship and trust with NGOs who have extensive knowledge about the issue and its manifestations.

Clear mandate: The role of the coordinator should be clarified, in terms of representation, official communication and actions that can be undertaken, also defining the remit of issues to be covered.

Communication and consultation process: Transparency is key to build trust with civil society organisations who are on the ground in direct relation with communities. Communication and consultation processes need to be clarified to ensure meaningful participation of civil society.

Concrete objectives and action plan: The role of the coordinator cannot only be about listening and bringing issues to the political level without any accountability. The coordinator needs to set concrete objectives to achieve during their mandate and work on an action plan with evaluation processes.

At a time when parties using blatant islamophobic rhetoric have come to power in a number of EU member states, we need a clear signal from EU policy makers that they are committed to ensuring equality and inclusion for all members of European society.

New data released this week show that Muslims in Europe face discrimination in all areas of life. We need to start shifting our perspective and promote inclusive narratives and practices with regard to Muslims’ presence in Europe. Too often, they are seen as a ‘problem to manage’, writes Julie Pascoët.

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The signatories are part of an informal European coalition against Islamophobia, a platform of anti-racist/human rights/faith-based NGOs combatting anti-Muslim racism and hatred.

European organisations

European Forum of Muslim Women (EFOMW)

European Muslim Initiative for Social Inclusion (EMISCO)

European Network against Racism (ENAR)

European Network on Religion and Belief (ENORB)

Forum of European Muslim Youth and Student Organisations (FEMYSO)

National organisations

Alliance of Inclusive Muslims (AIM)

Anti-Racist Forum, Finland (ARF)

CAGE, UK

Center for Danish Muslim Relations, Denmark (CEDAR)

Collective against Islamophobia and Discrimination, The Netherlands (CTID)

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Comments

9 responses to “EU must get serious about tackling Islamophobia”

This makes me mad as hell.
Muslims are not a race.
Every single Muslim can become a non-Muslim, just like every Nazi can repent.
Criticism of Islam is NOT ‘Islamophobia’!
IS,al qaeda, Boko Haram, Taliban,
…but then ‘anti-Islam hatred’ needs to get a ‘European Commission Coordinator’
Where is the Anti-Islam Coordinator?
Why doesn’t the EU fight Islam ‘in the name of human rights’?
Islam cuts the hands of thiefs
Islam puts women in veils
Islam throws gays of buildings
Islam forbids women from marrying non-Muslim men
Everybody knows of the atrocities of IS…AND Saudi-Arabia AND Iran..which just implement Sharia.
anti-racism today cleary means support of sharia
I can’t believe these lying traitors!

This undemocratic, anti-European ‘Coordinator’ alone is enough reason to blow up the EU.
These people do not have our best interest at heart.
They are traitors.

This CTID is nothing but Abdou Menebhi of course just another jihadi fighting for the spread of his faith. The ‘peaceful’ jihad is what they call this.

What a bunch of weak-minded fools in this commission to go along with this. They don’t understand that their ‘human rights’ are being instrumentalized as tools for the spread of Islam…which doesn’t give two shits about ‘human rights’…how can these people be so incredibly stupid?

By saying that in EU is islamofobia it is same to say that during world war 2 rest of the world had germanofobia. This is just a spin trying to cover real nature of islam and its intolerance to the people of antoher religions. Islam was never and will be never part of Europe and must be kicked out of Europe

More specifically: ‘naziphobia’ because just like the Germans could ditch that ideology so can Arabs (and others) ditch their theology. There is nothing that inextricably bounds these people to their ‘faith’. Yet left wing liberal idiots treat it as such. They frequently call it ‘racism’ if attacks Sharia, Jihad, Mohammad or Takfiri induced Islamic in-group violence. Of course these ‘liberal’ (they are not really liberal) traitors are most often supported by their favorite minority: Muslims in making these false allegations.

Islam a term used to cover all the Muslim religions. Phobia irrational fear of. Islamophobia irrational fear of Islam, how is an unqualified commissioner going to treat this condition without a medical qualification ?

Presumably anti Muslim hatred doesn’t mean hatred of anti Muslims, or does it? So far I have never seen any definition of what exactly a hate crime entails.

Given the atrocities of 9/11. 7/7. Lee Rigby et al. Why are Muslims not being accused of hate crime? One would have thought those murder could be taken as such.

Using the word Islamophobia is a nonsense, it does not serve the cause it intends to help.
Here is the explanation and a much approporiate term to denounce hatred agains Muslims.
Why we should stop using the the term “islamophobia” to describe the rejection of Muslims.

More and more one hears and sees the word islamophobia being used to describe the attitudes and the behaviour of rejection and even hatred of Muslims. Some people go as far as getting it used to describe racial behaviour, the equivalent of the term «antisemitsm » towards Jews. This would make it an offense punishable in the eyes of the law.

Somes say that this term was invented by Khomeny against the iranian women who rejected the wearing of the vail. Some others suggest an earlier origin for this term. Nowadays, it is the Muslim fundementalists who have adopted it to describe men and women who oppose their radical actions. By extension, it is also used by different persons who wish to counter threats against Muslims but who do not really worry about what is the real significance or this word.

This word should be banned. It responds in no way to the meaning that people want to attribute to it and this can only create confusion in people’s minds and in debates.
.
The etymologie of this word shows :
Islam = name of a religion
Phobia = fear
Islamophobia = fear of Islam.

What does fearing a religion mean?
Even if by making a huge effort of imagination one could fear a religion, this is not a case of racism or xenophobia.

The danger is that if one adopts this term one could easily, as is often the case, accuse someone of islamophobia with no other proof than the perception and the subjectivity of the accuser.

The term islamophobia has no sense. It must be eliminated from subjects dealing with Islam and replaced by clearer words such as « discrimination », « rejection » or « hatred ». These words have a specific meaning that everyone can understand and which are linked to provable behaviour. They can be taken into consideration by a court.

In this way we can intervene more effectively and help the Muslims oppose those who refuse them the right to be our brothers and sisters in humanity by the unacceptable pretexts of origin, culture or beliefs.
The following about the use of the word islamophobia is an extract from an article by professor Guy Haarscher* entitled :

« The freedom of expression, blasphemy and racist comments : a double perverse deplacement »
« …one leaves the religious domain and one enters the terrain of racist comments. If you mock the religion that my community practices ? You do this because you do not like us, you cannot stand us, we are causing you irrational fear (phobia), you hate us. In short you are racists. All you have to do is read the newspapaers to understand that this kind of language is common….
The danger lies there : in the corruption of our language, that of Human Rights, of tolerance and of anti-racism. And at the same time the fundamentalists and true racists prosper… »

*Guy Haarscher is a philosopher and emeritus professor of the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters of the Université Libre de Bruxelles. He teaches at numerous foreign universities and high level institutions including Duke, Budapest, the Colleague of Bruges and at Venice for the EUIC.

The term islamophobia is invented as a tool to repress resistance to Islamization. Progressive liberals desire a future Islamic Europe, preferably also full of Africans instead of natives, for which they want low birthrates and miscegenation. They do not state it as such but they fight everybody who is against these things with moral outrage so you can deduce their goals logically.